Land Degradation

What does land degradation effect?

Land degradation effects -

- More and faster soil erosion (soil being moved by wind or water)

-Soil acidification (adding more acid to the soil)

-Soil water logging (areas with soil becoming flooded)

-Soil destruction

-Lakes and oceans, by soil getting flooded and making its way to water, then in turn polluting the lake or ocean.

What can you do at home and school to stop land degradation?

The causes of land degradation

There is a plan that is being started called the National Action Plan. This is where the government goes to different areas around the country and observes land degradation and helps to try and restore land. If you know of an area that is suffering from land degradation, you can tell the government where it is happening and they can try and help. Also recycling, taking care of your garden or other areas of land around your house and not littering can help towards stopping land degradation.

Some causes for land degradation are:

-Land clearing, such as clear cutting (when a group of trees gets cut down) or deforestation (when a whole forest gets cut down).

-If a farm/agricultural area isn't cared for properly and becomes unusable.

-Animals living in the degraded area eating too much of the land.

-Bad use of sprinklers, as in using to much water, leading to the area flooding.

-Soil contamination.

-Cars being driven over the land when they shouldn't be, in turn ruining the land.

What is being done to help stop land degradation?

Currently, 124 countries (including Australia) have signed

the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification.

This is a law that started in 1992 at the Earth summit.

The Earth Summit is where representatives from different countries meet to discuss world problems.

The law was passed in 1994. This law is helping to stop land degradation by restoring ruined land (at least in the countries who have passed the law),

conserve water and it is helping to provide lessons for farmers to tell them about land degradation,

why it is bad and how they can stop/prevent it.

Australia passed this law in 1994.

Land Degradation

What is land degradation?

By Amy Banner

Bibliography

Land degradation is when an environment has been ruined or become unusable because of human interference with the land. It can also be caused by just the environment (land) gradually dissolving or breaking down. Land breaking down, dissolving or being ruined makes the area that it is happening in an undesirable place for animals or people to live in, or for people to grow crops on. Natural disasters can cause land degradation, but people ruining land is the main cause. Land degradation is considered to be an important problem today as it is ruining the environment and agricultural/ farming areas that are growing crops for a lot of food. Land degradation covers a lot of different topics, but a few of the main things are -

- A loss of usefulness in the land, so basically the land may not be growing enough crops, the soil and weather may not be right for the crops there, etc.

- A loss of biodiversity. Which means a loss in the range of species living there and possibly a bad ecosystem (the way the environment and the animals living there live and work together to help each other.)

Approximately 40% of the world farming areas are suffering from serious land degradation.

Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_degradation

Department of Primary Industries -

http://vro.dpi.vic.gov.au/dpi/vro/vrosite.nsf/pages/lwm_land_deg

Queensland Government -

http://www.derm.qld.gov.au/land/management/land_degradation.html

Land Degradation -

http://www.botany.uwc.ac.za/inforeep/land3.htm

Google -

http://www.google.com.au/